SEU Dodo walks through the lush Brazilian woodland he knows well,
picking out medicinal plants: lobera for diabetes, one known as "the
king of medicines" for the menopause, another he claims can cure flu
in a day. But the search for the plants is getting harder and
harder. "A lot of our medicinal plants died this year because of the
lack of water," he says ruefully.

According to Seu Dodo and others living near the village of Sao Jose
do Buriti, springs that once watered the natural forest are being
sucked dry by vast tracts of fast-growing eucalyptus trees used in
the production of iron at a local company.

Six thousand miles away, the flames leap from one of the chimneys at
the Grangemouth oil refinery on the banks of the Firth of Forth. The
orange haze from the massive plant lights up the night sky as
thousands of barrels of oil are refined into petrol, diesel and
other products for the motor industry. The flares from the chimneys
belch carbon dioxide into the sky.

Brazil-Scotland; refinery-rainforest. At first glance, the two
places seem totally unconnected. But Grangemouth and Sao Jose do
Buriti are tied by a single thread: carbon trading

The great carbon credit con: Why are we paying the Third World to
poison its environment?

In the fields around this giant chemicals factory in Gujarat, the
barren soil smells of paint stripper and the water from the well
makes you gag. So why has it been given tens of millions of pounds
of taxpayer-funded UN green reward points, which are traded
hungrily on the financial markets at huge profit?